Blog Labels = Longer Visits

A lot of people wonder how they can create a Breakout Blog that will help build platform and connect them to their audience. This series on Blogging Tips looks at ways to maximize blog performance so they can reach these goals.

Thought I’d chime in with another very simple blog tip…using your Labels (in blogger) and Tags/Categories (in Word Press). These are the little content tags you can attach to posts and display in your sidebar.

Some people have theirs show up as a word cloud, where the most blogged about topics have a larger font. Others use a list format, where each blog label has a number next to it, showing how often the topic is mentioned.

Other blogs do not use tags for their posts. This is a shame, because using labels is a great way to keep visitors at your blog!

Let’s look at an example: a new visitor comes to your blog. They read your current post, maybe comment, and now want to see what other topics you like to explore. Sure, they can see the last few posts, but are these representative of the best your blog has to offer? Will a user have time to search for a keyword, hoping something they need pops up?

Now, take this same visitor, only this time they can view topic labels in your sidebar. Right away, the tags tell them exactly what you blog about. If a label catches their eye, you can bet they’re going to click on it and read a few more posts.

Some people assume a post archive works as a way to find those older posts. The truth is, knowing you posted 12 times in January doesn’t help me much. If I’m in a time crunch, I won’t have time to search your blog. I’ll simply move on.

So, bottom line? Use Labels. They are easy enough to add to your posts, and you should see an option to do so in your blog settings. In Blogger, you go to Design, then Blog Posts, edit and then, tick off ‘add labels‘. In WordPress, your Category & Tag widgets are on the right when you write a post, and you can add news ones whenever you like. Or add a widget that displays your most popular posts. Either way, visitors will have a road map to your best content!

The second bottom line is this: Use Labels Effectively. Try to create labels that are specific and allow you to group several posts together. Using bizarre or random labels might seem like a fun way to categorize posts, but they can make it hard to search your blog for specific content. As well, you end up with way too many tags, which bloats your sidebar and makes it harder to search. Fun tags are fine, in moderation.

Don’t be afraid to give a post several labels or tags. Maybe your post is about description, drafting and voice. Great! These are all concrete labels that will help your readers find exactly what they need, and may also give them more ideas on how your advice can help them. 🙂

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About BECCA PUGLISI

Becca Puglisi is an international speaker, writing coach, and bestselling author of The Emotion Thesaurus and its sequels. Her books are available in five languages, are sourced by US universities, and are used by novelists, screenwriters, editors, and psychologists around the world. She is passionate about learning and sharing her knowledge with others through her Writers Helping Writers blog and via One Stop For Writers—a powerhouse online library created to help writers elevate their storytelling. You can find Becca online at both of these spots, as well as on Facebook and Twitter.

40 Responses to Blog Labels = Longer Visits

Great advice. I’ve used an archive in the past and it definitely makes searching for topics a lot more difficult. The word cloud gives a quick at-a-glance index for what you’ve blogged about. And any seo company will tell you that one of the most effective ways to beef up your serp, is to get people linking within your site once they are there. Thanks

I am finally switching to WordPress and working with someone to figure it out professionally. I’m sure you’ve researched this as far as SEO and meta tags etc. Curious to hear your opinion on this Angela.

I just started a blog and between this post and a couple of others specifically GIVING DIRECTIONS I am so much less intimidated by the process!(I realize I am a bit late on this but the blogosphere is a bit overwhelming until you find your way around.)Thanks!

Holly, sorry I blew it for you, but thanks so much for mentioning SEO. I hope you post on that (let me know?) because I would really like to understand it better in laymen terms, and be advised on how to identify my own keywords without having to subscribe to an expensive service to do so.

EEV, glad you ditched your word verification. I have to say, I’ve only come across maybe two blog owners who have said spam still gets through and they had to slap the WV back on. We are all so busy, with many blogs we want to visit, so anything a blog owner can do to attract visitors is a good thing!

Karen, thanks for adding our button! I totally get a thrill when I find it somewhere.

I really appreciate everyone’s support. You guys are just so great and kind to us!

I agree. I don’t see the point in just posting archives. That doesn’t tell me what the posts are about, and let’s face it, we visit a lot of blogs and need to navigate quickly. No time to skim through them all to find one we like. Labels make it so much easier to get right to what we want to read.Plus, the easier your site is to use the more people are going to want to come back to it.

I’m awful at sorting out how to present things. If I can catch one of my kids, I can usually bribe them to help me figure something out. But whenever someone tells me something is easy, I wonder if they know what I’m dealing with. They can’t if they think I find it easy! ;o)

I’ve been using the labels since the start of my blog, and I’d love to put up some sort of gadget word cloud, but I don’t feel I have enough posts to justify it yet. I’m still trying to figure a nice template that reflects my writing.

But I gotta give you that: the last blog tip you gave me (eliminate word verification from comments) does increase comments – Thanks! But noticing it made me extremely annoyed by word verification when I stumble upon it! 😉

That is a good idea. I think I’ve been blogging for too long to have set labels for some of my posts in the beginning. I do like word clouds. I’ve never searched a blog this way…but it’s an interesting tip I should try.

You can specify which tags you want to show up in your sidebar. For example, on my gem post I added the mineral labels (like silicate) to my post’s labels so you could click it and see other like minerals. However, I did not put it in my sidebar for the reason you said. I didn’t want to bloat it or clutter it with labels most people won’t be interested in. I just let the main topics show.

When I first started blogging, I used labels but more for fun, I think. I really didn’t understand the purpose. Since then, I’ve revamped my labels and definitely try to categorize them more simply and distinctly.

I get a little label crazy at times, and I sometimes go into archives to add even more labels to existing posts when I think up a clever new one. Helping readers get to the stuff they want is the goal, and I don’t think anyone minds the long laundry list of topics in my sidebar. Or at least no one has complained yet. 🙂

hi miss angela! wow that a really good tip. i got lables but their pretty general like i use one that just says writing stuff. now im thinking could need to say more on it like writing stuff/dialog. something like that. same for my other ones. it could be easy to fix. thanks for a cool idea.…hugs from lenny

Yet another great tip that I wish I’d understood earlier! 😀 But what I do have is the new tool on the sidebar that shows your most popular posts. Which I perceive to be those of greatest value to my readers. Yes, some pretty good posts probably got lost from long ago, but at least I can move forward better.